Happy New Year!

Here's hoping everyone reading this (and those who aren't) will have a wonderful, safe, peaceful and happy 2010!!

P.S. I forgot to tell you that our insurance company automatically approved coverage of Avastin for another full year! We didn't do a thing to make it happen...just opened the mail and there was the happy letter with the awesome news! Yay!

So Now You Will Know What I Know

December 10th's CT scan showed no change. No growth! YAY! Unable to tell for sure if/how the last (and final) chemoembolization did was it was supposed to do because part of the liver is still too swollen. We'll look again in February/March.
Making an appointment with Dr. G who did the aforementioned procedure in order to get his thoughts on its outcome and if/when to do the RFA ("berry picking") procedure on the "little guys" on the right lobe.
While he was "in there" performing the chemoembo, he told us (later) that he noticed quite a lot of necrotic tissue on and within the tumor. This is good. This means the chemo is working; not by moving it or pulling it away from anywhere in particular anymore or shrinking it but it is killing it. Sure, walking around with a dead tumor in me doesn't sound like fun but as long as I keep up with the chemo treatments, I keep killing more and more of it until someone goes in there to take a closer look to determine just how much of the tumor is dead and/or turned to scar tissue so that they can then CUT IT OUT! Doc says this will probably take several more months. But it is by far the BEST damn news I've heard with regards to this tumor since November 16, 2007 (the day before diagnosis)!

I expressed my biggest fear to Kane: that if the chemo embo didn't work, then we'll be out of options from now on. She assured me easily by saying, "We're never going to run out of options. We'll always find something new to try if we need to." Whew.

I'm a little hesitant to completely believe that that's exactly how things will play out and such but I'm also just trying to let it sink in slowly into my consciousness to make sure it's real. Did she really say all that? Or was that when I was doing all the talking and just asking her to agree or disagree or re-clarify? And if that's the case, how much of it is really REAL?

Stop. All of those questions are just as detrimental to my psyche as the horrid "What If...?" Game! No second guessing. Just try to understand and continue to plug on through chemotherapy as best as possible. (BTW, thank you, doc, for the Marinol script! Finally!)

If I could find my digital audio recorder since the move, I would prefer to take that to my doctor visits so I can review what all she says after my 20 minutes are up and I'm out the door! I'll dig deeper before next appointment.

So now you know most of what I know. (You don't get to know all of what I know! Some of it is private only for me, Honey and direct parental-units to know - please don't go trying to drag any more out of them now!). I think the fighting is starting to show signs of paying off!

The Aftermath and Reality

So Christmas is over. All that preperation, the headaches, the running around rampant trying to find the perfect gift, the perfect wrapping paper, the perfect bow, the lines at the post office, the annoying "currently out of stock" messages, the tension that all this mounts to until it overflows and causes you to either crawl into bed until the Big Day or explode into a furious anger at someone near you for absolutely no good reason. Okay, not everyone does that last part. But sometimes you sure feel like you want to, right?

On the one hand, I am so thankful that it is over. It was a wonderful couple of days and nights shared with various groups of family members over a variety of meals and activities. I got received some great and thoughtful gifts and it appeared that everyone enjoyed the gifts I gave to them. The cycle is now complete for another year. I walk forward with fond memories tucked away to recite for my grandchildren one day in the future. But I really must admit that I can breathe easier now that it's come to a close.

If only someone else would come take our tree down and pack up all our decorations back into the basement!

Alas, with the thankfulness of the ending also comes the sadness and confusion and an emptiness inside when you wake up Monday morning, back to your regular routine again and say, "now what? This isn't as fun as THAT was! I wanna do it again!" You'll get your chance in another 364 days (that count is from Christmas day, not this day).

It's that emptiness that I want to address right now. It's all over. The fun has ceased. Now it's time to return to reality. REALITY. It may consist of going back to work and/or back to school, returning to your daily responsibilities and/or intensive clean up since, if your house is anything like mine, it looks like a Tazmanian Devil ran rampant through your home for the past week...lots of things that make up your reality. And you've got to admit...sometimes that's just plain sad and disappointing, right?

My reality consists of facing the fact that I still have cancer.

Just like when we were preparing and moving to our new home, I was able to stuff the fearful reality of my cancer wayyyyy back into the furthest, darkest recesses of my mind because Christmas is just too wonderful a time to think or talk about cancer so much! Yay!!!! But now today is Monday. The day before I get another chemo treatment and all the exciting side effects that are to come in the weeks to follow. Back to my stupid limitations and unexplained aches and pains. Back to my long lonely days of having a lot that needs to be done but lacking any energy to actually do even a small piece of it. That. Plain. Sucks. And it makes me sad. And cry. And feel a hole in my abdomen just above my stomach...maybe it's my soul.

I still don't know how to deal with it. You'd think after two solid years of this routine, I'd have it figured out by now; how to deal with the return of the reality of it all. But I don't. Instead, I'm really good at blocking it out as long as possible.

So now what do I do as I spend another night anticipating tomorrow's events? How do I handle getting up and dressed and moving to get to the clinic on time so they can show me my CT scan results and fill me up with drugs again? I'm fairly certain I don't have the strength or determination to face up to all that right now. How am I supposed to do it???

Merry Christmas

As the cashier said to us at Rite Aide the other night "Merry Chrismakwanzahanukkah". Mr and Mrs Honey wish everyone a safe, happy, and fulfilling Christmas!

Let the Festivities Begin!

Happy Birthday to my sweet, sweet Honey -- or as you all know him: Pete!!!

Tonight we're going to have a party at his favorite restaurant, The Rio Grande, and fill him up with burritos and margaritas!! And birthday cake, too! Twenty-six people are expected to come, even though it's been snowing all day long (and is expected to continue for 24 hours). He is very excited to see and visit with everyone! This time, I'll be sure to capture some good pictures to share right here!

Happy, happy day!

Some days

Some days I just want to say to everyone,

"Leave me alone. I have cancer."

or

"Would you mind being nicer to me? I have cancer."

or

"I don't need this bullshit! I have cancer! Isn't that enough?!"

Not every day. Not all the time. Just some days. This here is one of 'em. Like it or hate it, that's just the way I am.

Traditions

(One last thing about the weight gain...it's totally unfair and uncool that while I want to celebrate and jump up and down and be all excited about losing weight and being thinner again, it's bittersweet since my doctor warned me not to lose so much so quickly, ya know?? So I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place with this weight thing...secretly in the back of my mind I am proud and excited to need to buy new clothes soon, before my current clothes fall off me! But on the surface, I intend to discuss it at length with Dr. Kane, of course.)

The holidays are a time for traditions. I mean, we all probably have loads of traditions that span across all 365 days of the year, or at least on some of the major holidays. For instance, every Valentine's Day, Pete and I give each other a monkey in some fashion, whether it's a picture of one on a card or a stuffed animal monkey or whatever. Lately, we've been giving one another Ty Beanie Baby monkeys and yes, once we ended up getting each other the exact same thing!

It seems that Christmas time is the one time of year where traditions come up and are practiced with devotion among family and friends, probably world-wide. I have several that I grew up with, one of which is making Chex Mix with extra flavoring so that not a single piece of the mix lacks that worchestershire sauce and spice taste! In my family, I think I grew up with maybe at least a dozen traditions at this time of year. An ironic one stands out in my mind right now. After my parents split up and my mom was living on her own, she and I began making a shrimp dinner every Christmas Eve. We were both big fans of all things tangy and salty so we'd simply steam the shrimp with a hearty dose of the Bay Seasoning that comes in the cube-shaped tin. In fact, that's the only time of year that we'd use that tin of seasoning, I think! Anyway, we'd make that for our entree and have some good brie and a nice, crispy-on-the-outside baguette, and a rice pilaf on the side. And of course we'd load up with lemons to squeeze on the shrimps upon our plates! Then we'd inevtiably use hunks of the baguette to sop up the tasty juices that would fill the surface of our plates, almost like a soup. Mmmmmm. That was so good.

And here comes the ironic part...

When Pete and I spent our first Christmas together, I went with him to his parents' house on Christmas Eve. I felt very uncomfortable, but not because of being around his parents whom I'd just recently met; instead, I was uncomfortable because I wasn't sure how Christmas Eve could even REALLY be Christmas Eve without my mom's and my shrimp dinner! It was a tradition and we were of the belief that if we didn't do some of the traditions then maybe that holiday just wouldn't be as enjoyable as it could have been.

Imagine my surprise (and relief) when I arrived at the Kellers' home and saw a big Pyrex pan of shrimp floating in what looked like a very yummy and tangy sauce! Pete informed me that every Christmas Eve, they'd usually bake this shrimp dish in a sauce of Worchestershire sauce, lemon juice, and a few other special ingredients! This was FANTASTIC news for me! Christmas was no longer doomed because here I was able to have my shrimps and eat them, too!!!!
(Also just another reason we decided we were meant to be together!)

Instead of boring you with much more of my old traditions, I want to hear about YOUR holiday traditions! If you'd like to share yours, I'm sure we'd all enjoy reading and learning about the different traditions we all carry over from year to year, generation to generation. So feel free...now it's your turn to write...!

Weight Loss Isn't All it's Cracked Up to Be

About a month after diagnosis, I began chemo and started losing weight. Not because the chemo made me sick or anything. It's just that either the chemo or my liver itself simply reprogrammed what my body wanted and did not want to eat anymore. It was almost immediate. Even looking at fried food made my stomach turn and anything surrounded by a pool of grease would turn my gag reflex on high. I got used to it and just ate whatever I wanted because my Oncologist told me that although I was overweight, I should try not to lose much weight as I go through chemo.

Within the first 10 months or so, I lost about 60 pounds without even trying. While my girlfriends were trying this diet or that one and struggling to lose just a couple more pounds here and there, my pounds were just falling off of me with every step I took. I never really knew it since I don't weigh myself unless I'm getting my vitals taken when I check into the clinic for chemo.

After that 60 pounds, I remained at a steady weight. Still "overweight" but I was pleased to have to go buy new jeans that were two sizes smaller and finally getting away with wearing some just XL clothes at Target or Kohl's! I felt pretty cool and my doc wasn't concerned about it.

I've remained that 60 pounds lighter, at a steady weight pretty much ever since (we're talking two years as of yesterday). I had a goal weight number that I wanted to get under and my doc gave me the okay to do it. Again, I didn't try very hard but by then the size of my stomach had shrunk so much that I would only be able to finish maybe a quarter to a half of a meal put before me. I didn't change what I ate and i wasn't really conscious of pushing those last 4 pounds off. But one day about three months ago, while weighing in at the clinic, I discovered I had made it just under my goal weight! After a couple of "WOOOP! WOOOP!" celebrations with Pete and the nurse who got to weigh me that day (thank you, Antoinette!) I took a deep breath, smiled and was content to just stay at that weight from now on.

Well, my appetite is a tricky little thing. Sometimes I can't even stand to think of any food that isn't of a creamy consistancy and almost flavor-less, preferrably liquid, while other times, just days later, I may be craving bean burritos and nachos from Taco Bell (bless Pete for humoring me by enduring Taco Bell for dinner three times that one particular week not long ago!). I can't really anticipate it so I just go with the flow.

Soon after I hit my first goal weight, I asked my doc if it was still okay for me to lose some weight, since I knew that I was still "overweight." Despite the cancer, I knew that I wasn't at a healthy weight to begin with so why not incorporate a little managed weight loss within doing EVERYTHING that I can to help heal myself?? She said that losing weight was okay as long as it wasn't more than just 1-2 pounds per week and that I was building and maintaining muscle mass at the same time. Well, I didn't listen to that last half about muscle mass but I did hear the 1-2 pounds thing and wondered how I could accomplish that...when I still can't seem to control my appetite very well these days.

I've been on the treadmills a few times here and there. I don't really break a sweat but I do get my body and blood moving for a half hour and that's really all that I need (thank goodness we have a TV in front of our treadmill in the basement!). I don't do the treadmill to lose weight...I do it to get that blood moving and, hopefully, get some of that muscley stuff my doc mentioned. (Don't worry, I do know the importance of having muscle mass in my body and not losing the weight by losing that stuff. Muscles are important. I get it. Sooner or later I'll get brave enough to climb onto Honey's weight bench and press a few 5 pounds or so!)

Yesterday, I climbed on the scale here at home...I don't know why but I did it. My jaw hit the floor when I saw I had lost another 15 pounds. That's 15 pounds in three weeks! That's more than my doctor wanted me to do and I had only been on the treadmill once or twice in that whole period!

All night I was obsessing about it. I wanted to be psyched and happy and celebrate the fact that those jeans I bought that were two sizes smaller were now falling off of me and that I needed to punch a new hole in my new, smaller belt...but at the same time, I was worried (cause I'm good that that!). Why did all that weight slip away so quickly? I have been eating, I swear! I'm supposed to be pushing more protien down my throat but that's so hard to do when I have very little appetite. But I HAD been eating. So why did that weight just jump off me and run away!?!?

Now, ladies, please don't hate me or anything cause this was completely out of my control and apparently not a good thing. So I told Pete all about it when he got home from work yesterday and after pondering it for a couple hours off and on, we realized that those 15 pounds may very well have been water weight!

Remember all the leg and foot swelling I've been enduring for the past month or so? Some days they're not swollen and other days they are. Doc's got me on a prescription (ie. heavy duty) diuretic, hoping that will help and I've been drinking water like it's going out of style (just cause I love water). I try to slow down my water intake around 7pm but I am still getting up a half dozen times for a trip to the Loo throughout the wee hours of the morning. It had gotten so bad that I also brought that up to Pete as an unrelated subject so that we could figure out a better way for me to cut back my water intake in the evenings while still being able to take ALL my necessary pills at night.

But yesterday, after probably my 80th trip to the restroom, I realized that my kidneys were kind of aching, really tired, pretty much worn out. So, we put two and two together and concluded that yes indeed that 15 pound weight loss was due to scheping off all that water weight. It makes perfect sense, especially since I spent more time IN the bathroom than OUT of the bathroom yesterday! (Or so it seemed!) And, big surprise, today my legs aren't nearly as swollen as they were just a couple days ago.

So it was just water. Or so we've deduced. Doc's got me on this diuretic twice a day but today I'm cutting it down to once a day and I'm emailing Nurse Gari to make sure that's okay to do (don't want to break any of my doctor's rules if I can help it! That is, unless she's wrong. LOL).

We're just a little confused that this happened so suddenly since I've been on that diuretic pill twice a day for three weeks now and all of a sudden I notice it's physical affect on me and my life. I would've guessed it would begin to do so as soon as I started taking said medication. Ah well, I'm not the boss of pills (although I may be the VP since I take so damn many of them! One day soon I'll post for you a lovely layout picture of all the pills I take throughout the day. I now refer to them as "A rainbow of fruit flavors!" since they're all different colors, shapes and sizes!)

So if you're walking down the street someday and you happen to see me floating on past you, please toss me a life preserver because I'm actually getting tired of all this weight loss!

Better Day

Horray! My legs and ankles and feet are not so swollen today!!! I literally woke up and they were almost back to normal!

I found some compression hose at a local drug store over the weekend and although they mostly fit, they're still pantyhose - one of the most uncomfortable piece of clothing in a woman's wardrobe! I had them on for 30 minutes before I had to take them off...who hangs out at home on the weekends with their pantyhose on???? LOL NOT ME! Actually, I took them off because since they are compression hose, the waist band was compressing on my abdomen, right across my liver, causing me a whole other world of discomfort and pain. When I took them off I decided to hunt down some knee-high socks that are not nearly as firm as the pair I bought (and can't even get on my feet, they're so tight!) a few weeks ago.

Anyway, not wearing hose or compression socks wasn't that big of a deal. I'm not exactly sure what happened but yesterday evening, I jumped on the treadmill at a simple walking pace for 30 minutes. The first 10 minutes made my left (the most swollen and painful) leg and all the muscles from toe to hip tingle and ache, as if they haven't been used in a long time. Like they were waking up or something. I worked through it and it felt much better. I was reminded from a radio show earlier in the day that after a work out is the best time to consume protien since the body is awake and the blood is pumping and can take in nutrients much better than it does when it's still. After my workout, I ate a protien bar and chugged a big bottle of Propel. Then i went about my normal evening with Honey (Selena made us a DELICIOUS batch of macaroni and cheese that we finally were able to cook and enjoy last night! YUM!).

Anyway, this morning, I looked down at my ankles and they were actually there! Not cankles, but actual, unswollen ankles! And my leg wasn't nearly as bloated as before! My left leg is still red and sometimes a dark purple color but again, it's not nearly as bad as before. I'm looking forward to telling my doctor this when I see her after Christmas!

The next time I post here, it won't be about my medical chaos. It's time for a break from all of that. It makes me miserable just focusing on it every single day. So from now until the Tuesday after Christmas when I get my next chemo treatment, I'll be working hard on not thinking about my symptoms, side effects, medications, discomfort, confusion, fear, cancer. Period. It's been a couple months since I've had a self-initiated "cancer-break" - I think it's high time I have one again! Now all I have to do is come up with something interesting enough to post here! (Like swollen feet and CT scans are so very interesting anyway! :P) I'm sure I'll think of something...so keep coming back!

Suggestions, please!

Does anyone have any idea where I might be able to find some compression hose? You've probably heard of the compression socks to wear so your feet and legs don't swell up while you're sitting forever on an airplane or have serious blood pressure issues. I have a pair of ankle-length and knee-highs but neither pair work for me; in fact, they cause me even more pain than the swelling itsself. So my dear doctor recommends I try an even longer pair of compression "socks" in the form of compression tights of hose. She says if I can't find them then I am to try just regular support-style pantyhose but who wants to wear panty hose around the house when you're not wearing a skirt or working in an office or something like that?!?!? Seriously. Yuck. And ow.

I emailed her earlier today in a panic, thinking the worst, of course, as to why my legs and feet are so swollen and painful. I asked her if my liver was starting to shut down. Her answer was a straight forward, adamant NO. Thank goodness! My albumin levels are still low and to help with the swelling she suggested A) the aforementioned hose, 2) walking more throughout the day, each day and C) possibly going to clinic once or twice a week for albumin infusions like I had with last Friday's chemo. I'd rather start with A & B for a few days before committing myself to more trips to and from the clinic.

So if you have any experience with this type of thing or just happen to know where I can find myself a sturdy pair of compression tights, please, leave such information for me in the comments box!!! :)

Thanks!

Again, with the legs

My feet and legs are still swollen and painful. Even if I stay off them all day long, they still hurt like hell in the evenings. Plus, after I've been off my feet for any length of time, it hurts twice as much when I do eventually get up and walk around. Eventually (and fortunately!) the pain subsides a bit and I can almost walk without wobbling like a Weeble (and I don't fall down!).
I already emailed my doc about it this morning; maybe she can get me in to see her before my CT scan this evening, or at least put my mind at ease via email before then (I asked her a really tough question).
I suppose I should resurrect some of those online cancer support groups I found early in this cancer..."career" and see if anyone there has any suggestions for me.
I've been pretty much stuck in this house all week - no appointments, no lunch dates, nothin'. I'd go out on my own and do some light shopping if it weren't for A) the swelling issue (which, like I mentioned, I can work through the pain and get to a less painful ability to walk around) and B) these incredibly FREEZING temperatures we've had here all week!!!! It snowed last weekend and by normal Colorado standards, it should all be mostly melted by now since we've now had a couple days of bright, blue skies. Alas, our state is pretending to be Minnesota or something in that Sunday through Tuesday we had single-digit temperatures, and yesterday was in the teens and today we'll be lucky if we break higher than 25 degrees! THAT IS STILL BELOW FREEZING! I hate the bitter cold like this (who doesn't?!) so I'm just trying to grin and bear it like everyone else in town. By the weekend we should be in the 40's for a couple of days before the temp drops and it snows again next week. I mean, seriously, if I wanted to live on an iceburg, I would've packed warmer clothes and chosen a trip there myself! This is awful here in Colorado! But hey, I guess if it gets my bathrooms cleaned, the tree put up and decorated, the sheets changed, etc, then there is a silver lining to even that, too, eh?

When in Doubt, Prescribe Another Pill!!!!

Later this week, I'll be showing you a photograph of all the pills I take on a daily basis, so that you get an idea of what keeps me busy all day every day - HA! Actually, I saw a young adult cancer fighter do such a thing on her blog not too long after my diagnosis and I thought it was intriguing. It's going to take quite a bit of organization, though, and Sundays are not good days for me to be organized! No reason...just cause I'm rather lazy on Sundays! Raise your hand if you are, too!

Friday at the clinic and in infusion getting my chemo went swimmingly. Well, we (Pete and I) talked with both my nutritionist and my doc about my painful balloon legs and feet and it was nothing they haven't seen before. Basically, (and I had already discovered this on my own) it is caused by low albumin levels in my blood. [[[WARNING: Stop now if you are not interested in a bunch of medical mumbo-jumbo and my creative interpretations of it all!]]]] Go back there and click on the link for a very detailed, fancily-worded definition on Wikipedia. Or keep reading on here to enjoy my sketchy translation!

So my doc, nutritionist and Nicole, my lovely chemo nurse, all explained it to me like this: albumin is a water-soluable protien in the blood system (think: egg whites). Part of it's job is to keep the water tucked happily in my veins and it's produced by my liver (heh, what isn't!?). As a result of all this chemo (in about a week it'll be two years' worth!), naturally, the liver's having trouble producing enough albumin on its own, therefore, some of the water in my bloodstream has leaked out and, because of gravity, it all ends up in my lower extremeties! That makes sense, right? Don't worry, it's not dangerous at this stage. In fact, it's quite common in patients undergoing lengthy chemotherapy treatments.

How do we fix the problem? A couple of methods...

1) Doc ordered some albumin serum to be administered to me intreveinously while I got my chemo on Friday to kind of help give the albumin in my system a jump start or a nudge in the right direction.

2) Doc prescribed a medication that's supposed to help keep my albumin levels up (or so I understood...Pete may end up correcting me on this and that's ok. To me at this point, it's just more pills!).

3) The aforementioned pills tend to wreak havoc on my potassium levels so I was ordered to look up what foods are high in potassium and eat a few of those every day. A simple search and a trip to the organic foods store and I'm all set! Good thing I like dates and stuff! I have a wide variety for snacking.

4) Since albumin is a protien, I need to increase my protien intake on a daily basis, too. Sounds easy enough, right? When I told my Daddy this, he kept repeating, "Prime Rib!" and "T-Bone Steak!" etc. But along with just about every other normally-enjoyed food out there, red meat is one of the last things I can even think of eating without my gag reflex going nuts (thanks, chemo, drugs, and/or cancer -- we don't know which to blame!). So I've got alternatives. I drink a pre-made protien shake like Boost, Ensure or Carnation Instant Breakfast every day at lunch time (unless I'm out and about and feel well enough to eat out and about) because I've always been very bad about making myself lunch and eating all of the meal. The shakes are a piece of cake and drinking what tastes just like chocolate milk for lunch is certainly not a bad thing to get used to, eh?! :) In addition to the shakes, I eat yogurt, cheese, eggs, peanut butter (on pretzles, crackers or fruit), and I make smoothies with frozen fruit (which helps increase my fruit and veggie intake each day, too) and a yummy protien powder I found! There are a few other protien rich foods in our pantry that I don't need to list here for you but you get the picture: protien helps the albumin along with all the other stuff listed above.

5) Doc also prescribed a fancy diuretic to help drain the excess water from my legs and feet since the OTC kind wasn't doing me any good t'all.

Wanna know the results so far? Well, all this started Friday and we finally got all the prescriptions filled and the potassium-rich food purchased by yesterday and thusfar, my feet and legs are WAY less swollen than before!!! They're still a bit sore to the touch but I know that'll subside in time. I still have (and hate) my cankles (when the ankle is so swollen from fluid or fat that you can't see where the calf stops and the ankle begins!) but that too will take time to go down.

There you have it...the chain reaction of the cause of my swollen extremeties! WOO HOO! How exciting! Now, if you only come by here to check up on my medical status and don't give two hoots about the rest of my life, feel free to stop reading at this point. The rest of you may proceed and I thank you for doing so. :)

Yesterday Pete hung holiday lights outside of our house: along the fence line and part of the medium sized blue spruce we have in our front yard. Since we're on the corner lot and that lovely little tree sits parallel to a four-way stop sign, we felt obligated to "spruce up the spruce" for passer-by to enjoy! Mostly, when we first saw the house months ago, we saw the spruce and instantly called it "The Christmas Tree!" Anyway, halfway up the tree, poor Peter ran out of our new strand of LED lights! No big whoop, we'll just hop in the car and run back to Home Depot for some more. Oops. They're all out! No biggie, we'll just go across the street and get them at Super Target. Oh my! They're all sold out of them, too! Ah! I remember last week we saw tons of them at Walgreens! And who would think of going to Walgreens of all places to buy their Christmas lights, right?! Pete called them (to save us some gas) and they, too, were all sold out! RAWR!!!!!

The problem cannot be solved today because A) it's been snowing since the wee hours of the morning, B) the temperature is only in the teens and I don't want a popsicle for a Honey, and C) my Daddy took Pete to a big gun show for the majority of the day today! So I've made a list of stores that do and may carry LED lights and I'll be calling them tomorrow to find out when/if they'll get new shipments in of our lights. Jeeesh. What a pain.

He put the indoor pre-lit Christmas tree up too, last night and it's 7'.5" tall. It look HUUUUUGE in our old house but in our new house in the one room with the vaulted cathedral ceiling, it only looks medium-sized!!! LOL That's okay though because it's still beautiful framed by the two windows on either side of it.

Now the rest of that room is filled with messy boxes of old Christmas decorations. Since we were in Houston last year, I had tore through almost all those boxes and quickly repacked some of the decor that I wanted to take with us down to Texas. So now, the boxes are all sloppily packed and half full of random decorations! My job today was supposed to be to go through said boxes and decorate the tree but, again, I bring up the Lazy Sunday excuse for you to consider! I'll do a bit later today and the rest throughout the early part of the week. I also got a few of those big green Rubbermaid bins while at Target so that I can be better organized when it all comes down after Christmas! Horray!

I'm feeling pretty good though very tired. Tired from the chemo maybe or it could be the meds I'm on or maybe the lowered iron levels (also a protien-related issue for which I'm taking iron supplements) or I didn't get enough sleep last night or my body's working over time to fight this nasty tumor...who knows why and I gave up caring WHY a long time ago! I take care of myself instead. If I need a nap, I take one. If I need to just be sitting to do something, I do that. If I'm too tired to decorate the Christmas tree all by myself, then I procrastinate it until Pete comes home or I can ask for help during the week! That's how it goes over here!

Here is another attempt to get my readers involved in my blog, to hear/read your voices and what you have to say. Please feel free to answer and describe in the comments box below if you'd like to participate! NO MORE LURKERS!

(If you already answered this on my Facebook page and don't want to again here, that's alright by me.)

For those of you who do put up a Christmas tree, do you put up a REAL or FAKE tree? If it's a fake tree, how old is it? >:) be honest!

Expelliarmus!!!

A very dear family friend of mine and my dad's doesn't send chatty catch-up-with-you type emails at all but I always know he's there. Last week on Thanksgiving, he sent me the following message:

Go to the toy store.

Buy Hermione's wand (Harry Potter).

Put a label on it, "Abbey's wand of power".

Rub it across your liver and cast the Patronus charm, "Expelliarmus".

The Patronus charm is projected by focus[ing] on a really happy experience.

Imagine your Patronus fighting the cancer cells.
Keep the wand where you can see it.

Use it when you walk by.

Love to you and yours,

steve & Jane

Few words and to the point, that's Steve (well, in writing anyway!!!). But it meant the world to me! I was so touched and I still have warm fuzzies lingering in my heart from his message.

Amazon notified me that the wand shipped yesterday.